USB KVM (⌨️Keyboard, 🖥️Video, 🖱️Mouse / 👆🏽Multi-touch) controllable over HTTP.
Controlling an Android phone over USB with touch and keyboard
Automating a Mac Setup Assistant
Roadie turns a low-cost HDMI capture dongle and a pair of microcontroller boards into a browser-based KVM that works with anything that has a screen and a USB port: laptops, desktops, phones, tablets, servers, embedded devices. View the target's display in a browser, and send keyboard, mouse, and multi-touch input back to it — no software required on the target.
Automate Roadie with Vibium or any browser automation library — Selenium, Puppeteer, WebDriverIO, etc.
- Device provisioning: automate OS setup assistants with an AI agent before SSH or VNC exist on the target
- Mobile device testing: drive phones and tablets from a browser without touching them
- Remote tech support: view and control someone's device from another room or across the network
- General IP-KVM: same idea as PiKVM or TinyPilot, but with multi-touch support and a ~$86 BOM
Roadie uses one device to set up or control another. It grabs video from an HDMI-to-USB capture dongle and serves it over HTTP, turning a remote device's physical display into a web page. A pair of microcontroller boards act as a USB KVM, sending keyboard, mouse, and multi-touch input to the target device. An AI agent (or a human) can view the screen in a browser, grab frames for vision analysis, and send input back — all over HTTP.
Host (Pi, Mac, Linux)
+--------------------------+
| Go server (roadie) |
Browser <---->| HTTP / WebSocket |
| Serial JSON |
+---+------------------+---+
| USB serial | USB (MJPEG)
+-----v-----------+ +--v-------------------+
| Relay board | | HDMI capture dongle |
| (QT Py) | +--^-------------------+
| JSON -> binary | | HDMI in
+-----+-----------+ |
| UART |
+-----v-----------+ |
| HID board | |
| (QT Py) | |
| binary -> USB | |
+-----+-----------+ |
| USB HID | HDMI out
+-----v---------------v----+
| Target device |
| (Mac, PC, Android, iOS) |
+---------------------------+
VNC and remote desktop require software running on the target. If the target is mid-setup, locked out, or doesn't have an OS yet, they can't help.
Other hardware KVMs also work at the hardware level, but generally don't target mobile devices or multi-touch, and aren't designed for programmatic control by automation tools or AI agents. Roadie adds multi-touch alongside keyboard and mouse, and includes a WebDriver BiDi endpoint so browser automation libraries can drive it.
MDM tools manage devices over the network but require enrollment, platform-specific agents, and an already-configured OS. Roadie works at the hardware level — it doesn't care what OS is running or whether the device is enrolled in anything.
| Qty | Part | Price | Link |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2x | Adafruit QT Py RP2040 | $9.95 ea | adafruit.com |
| 1x | Tiny premium breadboard | $3.95 | adafruit.com |
| 1x | Breadboarding wire bundle | $4.95 | adafruit.com |
| 1x | USB adapter kit (A↔C) | $6.99 | amazon.com |
| 1x | HDMI-to-USB-C 1080p capture | $16.99 | amazon.com |
| 1x | HDMI male-to-male adapter | $5.99 | amazon.com |
| 1x | USB-C to HDMI + USB-A + USB-C PD hub | $17.99 | amazon.com |
| 1x | USB-A to USB-C cable | $8.99 | amazon.com |
You also need a host computer to run the roadie server — a Raspberry Pi 4 (2GB+), Mac, or Linux PC.
Prerequisites: macOS or Linux, Go 1.21+, Python 3.10+
git clone https://github.com/VibiumDev/roadie.git && cd roadie
make setup # one-time: python venv, dependencies, udev rules
make flash-hid # flash first board, then unplug it
make flash-relay # flash second boardConnect the two boards with jumper wires (TX-to-RX, RX-to-TX, GND-to-GND), plug the relay board into your host, the HID board into the target, and the HDMI capture dongle between the target's video output and the host. Then:
make # build
./roadie # runOpen http://localhost:8080/view to see and control the target's screen.
- HID control: absolute mouse, multi-touch digitizer, and keyboard input via USB, controllable over HTTP/WebSocket
- Interactive viewer:
/viewpage with live feed and full HID control (mouse, touch, keyboard) directly on the stream - Auto-detection: finds external capture devices, skips built-in cameras
- Hot-swap: plug/unplug devices without restarting
- Auto-crop: detects and removes black bars from HDMI capture (pillarbox/letterbox), remaps touch coordinates to match
- Runtime settings: adjust quality, FPS, and resolution on the fly from the viewer
- Audio streaming: optional PCM audio over WebSocket
- Bonjour/mDNS: discoverable as
roadie.localon your network - Cross-platform: runs on macOS and Linux (Raspberry Pi, Ubuntu, etc.)
- Resilient: automatic reconnection with exponential backoff, signal loss detection
| Doc | Description |
|---|---|
| API Reference | HTTP/WebSocket endpoints, HID commands, USB keycodes |
| Protocol Reference | Binary wire format between relay and HID boards |
| Board Reference | Hardware specs, wiring, USB identifiers, LED behavior |
| Architecture | System design, pipeline, and design decisions |
| Flash Boards | Flashing, re-flashing, and syncing board code |
| Troubleshooting | Common problems and fixes |
| Automate with Vibium | Drive Roadie with JavaScript using browser automation |
| REPL Tutorial | Interactive debugging via CircuitPython REPL |
make # build binary
make test # run tests
make test-circular # end-to-end test (type + mouse) through both boards
make clean # remove binarySee Flash Boards for re-flashing and syncing board code.